


it's cold and it's broken

by angelica_barnes



Category: Harry Styles - Musician, Taylor Swift (Musician)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canonical Character Death, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Falling In Love, Gun Violence, Inspired by Music, Love Confessions, Marriage Proposal, Physical Abuse, a somewhat happy ending, as in don't trust me on that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-07-19
Packaged: 2019-06-13 00:33:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15352284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelica_barnes/pseuds/angelica_barnes
Summary: Taylor falls in love a few different times.only one sticks.(she never thought she'd go through all this, that she'd find her other half in jail, but there it is.)(she never thought she'd be in jail at all.)





	it's cold and it's broken

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from "Hallelujah"

Taylor touches her fingers to her lips, the ghosts of a million kisses belonging to a million boys and they escape her mouth with memories and puffs of smoke. She remembers every one, of course, but she wants to forget all but one.

They each have qualities, and setbacks, but only one has everything. Even he had to wait in line, and she nearly missed him when his turn came.

She’s glad she didn’t, she thinks, even if maybe he didn’t stay forever.

 

 

-

 

Tim came first, if she remembers correctly. He was handsome, stubble gracing his chin and a crooked smile, and such a tall glass of water. He had an okay taste in music too, but not always when it came to choices.

“I think you’re overthinking this,” Tim had said, when she’d hesitantly told him she loved him, and her sixteen-year-old mind had a bit of a breakdown, but her smile could cover it up. 

“But seriously,” he continued, with a laughing swing of his half-empty glass - beer, she never liked it, it always tasted like pennies and tangy fruit - “we’re just having fun. And you’re too young to know what love is.”

She turned red with anger and pulled him forward by the collar, jerking his balance so his drink fell and he nearly toppled off the stool, and she kissed him, long and hard for one last time. He moaned and she bit down on his lip with enough force to draw blood, and blood she drew as the scent and breath of rust and salt filled her lungs.

Tim hissed in pain as she pulled back, spitting on the carpet, “It wasn’t just fun to me, Timothy.”

And then she sashayed out the door, relishing the feeling a few hundred pairs of eyes following her, thinking that maybe she could get used to this, the rush it gave her.

Tim came first, sure, but he certainly didn’t live up to the specialness of it.

 

 

-

 

Calvin was strong, too strong, sometimes. Taylor liked to trace the lines of his muscles, as did other women, but she tried to convince herself that she was the only lady among them.

Calvin came around the time that she lost count, but he might’ve been eleventh in line. That was pretty far down the list, but perhaps she hadn’t given up yet, despite the week-to-week, jump then fall.

He’d met her at a club and bought her a drink, then asked her to dance, and her eighteen-year-old self had plenty of fun with him later, in the bedroom of a two-star hotel. She could afford much better, but wasn’t really thinking of it at the moment.

When they woke up, he asked her on a date, and she took her time to answer - as the player she was painted as, she let herself change slowly in front of him, brushing through her blond strands with purpose and a tantalizing speed; seducement.

He treated her well, like a true gentleman should - he bought her little things to remind her how he felt and that he listened, he took her to places that she’d only dreamed of, and he was sweet and savoring when it came to unspeakable matters.

And he was perfect, but that was just it.

He wasn’t the imperfect kind Disney prince she’d been dreaming of, and she supposed that was fine, because who’s gonna find a Prince Charming to ride off into the sunset with? It didn’t happen, not then, not even now, and Calvin, she guessed, was the closest thing.

But he didn’t feel right, and she couldn’t settle for less than what she needed - wanted.

So he should’ve known, _he_ _should have known_ \- but he bought a ring for her, and she found it. She prayed he wouldn’t ask, and she tried to drop hints that she wasn’t ready, not in the slightest, but he didn’t catch them.

He got down on one knee, one night when they had a candlelight dinner and if she’s answering honestly, she should have seen it coming. But she didn’t, and she stood awkwardly with the man she loved asking for forever and an unsteady heartbeat, and so with tears in her ears she shook her head,  _ No. _

And he stormed out, leaving her alone and both of them were heartbroken. He drank, she cried, things fell apart, and - she doesn’t regret it.

But she wishes they could have talked it through, because she wanted to keep him. As a friend, or maybe for forever someday, but instead she lost him, with the simple shake of her head and the words,  _ I’m not ready. _

 

 

-

 

Stephen was beautiful. Not necessarily on the outside, with an uneven tan and long fingers, giant glasses and breath that smelled like too many mints, but his mind was brilliant, and his heart and soul were almost purely good.

But alas, Taylor often held on a little too tightly. 

It’s not like her twenty-year-old self knew how to let go, or when she was doing something a little wrongly, so she had no idea. And Stephen didn’t tell her, so she wanted to blame him - but it was her fault, she knew.

He used to hold her close, hand resting possessively on her waist out in the public’s reign of eye. She felt safe with him, and he whispered that he loved her, and she took a little time, but eventually found it within her to say the words back.

And it was wonderful.

Paradise, she believed, with the small exceptions of cruel words tossed around at home, but nobody had to know. They were always apologized for anyway, and that was enough, because everybody makes mistakes, Taylor reasoned, Taylor thought.

But soon words turned to slurs and curses and those turned rough hands that curled into fists and feet that kicked hard, and the air was stifling - breathing, once a daily task, became something she was afraid to do, especially when he was home, and she jumped when the door opened.

And one day her father pulled her aside and handed her a small gun, big enough for impact, but small enough to hide, and pointed to Stephen, who was speaking to Taylor’s mother with an aggravated smile.

“Shoot for the legs,” he told her, and she listened with tears in her eyes as he caressed her bruises. “Then he can’t walk, and you won’t have killed him. And whatever you do, don’t drop it.”

She nodded and he let her cry into his chest, until Stephen came over to grab her arm and hiss that they were going home, and she waved her parents goodbye.

And then it did become too much, and he pushed her back into the nightstand, the lamp shattering as her back cracked with the hit, and she reached behind her shivering body to search the drawer with numb fingers, and finally they curled around the holster of the gun. She unclipped it and Stephen suddenly seemed wary, but then she whipped out the weapon and pointed it to his chest with teary eyes.

“Don’t come closer,” she sobbed, and her shaky hands caused the gun to rattle, but she kept her hand on the trigger. But he was drunk and lunged anyway, so she had no choice; she squeezed her eyes shut when she did it, turning away.

He yelled and she heard the thump of his body hitting the floor, hole in his leg bleeding out onto the hardwood floor, and she let a sob rip from her throat as she grabbed the always-packed duffle bag hidden behind the always-open door.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered through her tears, and Stephen only groaned in pain, eyes bloodshot and furious when they met hers, and she knew she had to leave, even if she did want to stay and take care of him, heal him from her own self-defense act, but she knew it’d do no good.

“I loved you,” she sobbed as she backed towards the door. “I really, really did.”

And she called the paramedics and then ran, but they caught her shaking, crying self anyway.

Behind bars wasn’t a pleasant place to be, but it was better than living with Stephen.

 

 

-

 

One day she woke up to an open cell door, and she wandered two steps into the hallway, looking right and left and hoping to find a person. But there was only a guard, the kind one named Mason, and he whispered to her gently that she’d been bailed out.

It’d been a year since Stephen, and she was still bone-tired, still too scared to step out into daylight, still too sad to consider the risk of anyone with love branded on their skin.

Mason led her to the release room, where she signed some papers, and then he took her out to the lobby with her newly acclaimed belongings to see a kind-eyed curly-haired man standing there, waiting for someone. But Mason walked her over to him, and she clung to him fearfully, murmuring frantically that  _ I don’t know this man. _

“I’m Harry,” Kind Eyes said, and he smiled softly at her, slowly extending a hand. “I’m the one who bailed you out.”

She started crying and wailing, and Mason tried to calm her down, but she was too caught up in her lost world, the one with too many bad memories, until Kind Eyes crouched down next to her and placed a gentle hand on her back, “Hey.”

She looked up at him, eyes wide and filled with tears, and he smiled at her again. “I just want to help. It’s your choice of whether or not to let me.”

And she leaned into him, letting him hold her on the cold cement of the prison floor. He rubbed her back and asked her name, and she answered it’s Taylor, but distantly, because she supposed she’d slightly forgotten.

And she eventually decided to take his hand and stand on knocking knees, and he helped her to the car, where he laced their fingers together and held her hand like that for the entire ride, the entire trip, and they stopped and picked up clothes and food and other things she needed, and then they reached a house; “Home sweet home,” Harry said, and she smiled.

He reminded her a bit of Calvin, and how perfect he was, but Harry wasn’t exactly that. He was lanky and covered with random tattoos, and his curls were tangled in the mornings and his eyes had bags under them some days and he was grumpy before tea and was a bit messy, but he also cooked and danced with her and told her stories and listened when she told hers, and he never pushed her to something she didn’t want.

“Why’d you save me?” She asked one day, and he kissed her lips softly, still with occupied hands as he scrubbed the dishes clean in suds and water. “You didn’t know me at all.”

He laughed quietly, and she smiled, eyes flicking down, away from his pretty face she never tired of. “I was visiting my dad and I saw you. You were a wreck, and you looked like an empty soul of a person,” she huffed indignantly and Harry smiled, “but you weren’t. And I needed to save you, because I knew that whatever you did, you’d payed for it enough without having to spend time in there.”

She wrapped her arms around his torso, and she didn’t even care how wet his hands were when he hugged her back, pressing kisses to her hair.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “I notice I’ve never said it.”

He shook his head, hugging her tighter, “Meeting you was thanks enough.”

 

 

-

 

And Harry feels safe. He feels like home, like love, like everything she’s been looking for and been afraid of. He takes her into his arms and he’s the only one who never lets go, and she doesn’t want him to.

But all good things come to an end, and one day Harry becomes unbreathing on their bed, and she kisses his lips one last time.

Harry had to wait, and now she has to - she wonders if he’s still there with open arms, watching the gates. She nearly missed him, she thinks with a sad smile, then has another thought.

She’s glad she didn’t, miss him that is, even if maybe he couldn’t stay forever.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know any of these people, all personality traits come from my imagination. completely fictional


End file.
